(ft Bcto? 

BJ 2101 



anb f)er betters 



By KATHER1NE E. CON WAV. 



rn\;r.nFSS 




LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, 



COPYRIGHT OFFICE. 



No registration of title of this book 
as a preliminary to copyright protec- 
tion has been found. 

Forwarded to Order Division .Jpvdb-ZM^JSP-i 

Q J(Date) 
(6, i, 1906-2,000.) 




FAMILY SITTING-ROOM SERIES. 



(£ 

Raty cmb ^tx Rtttm 

By KATHERINE E. CONWAY. 
SIXTH EDITION. 

boston: 

THOMAS J. FLYNN & COMPANY. 
1905. 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS; 
Two Copies Kecetv«M 



JUL 6 ^08 



Copyright cult* 



Copyright, 1904. 
By Katherine E. Conway. 




GLASS 



XXC. No. 



A II rights reserved. 



COPY B, 



Books by Katherine E. Conway. 



Lalor's Maples. 

A Novel. Third edition. $1.25. 
The Way of the World and Other Ways. 

A Story of our Set. Third edition. $1.00. 
New Footsteps in Well-Trodden Ways. 

Sketches of Tiavel. Third edition. #1.25. 
A Dream of Lilies. 

Poems. Third edition. $1.00. 
Watchwords from John Boyle O'Reilly. 

Edited and with Estimate. Sixth edition. 

75 cents. 



Family Sitting-Room Series. 

A Lady and Her Letters. 

Sixth edition. 50 cents. 
Making Friends and Keeping Them. 

Fifth edition. 50 cents. 
Questions of Honor in the Christian Life. 

Fourth edition. 50 cents. 
Bettering Ourselves,, \ 

Third edition. 50 cent!. 

The Christian Gentlewoman and the 
Social Apostolate. 

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Received from 
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Cl)e jFttenfca at toljosc fctstre 3f fjatoe matie tt, 
2Tf)i0 little 33oofc, 



CONTENTS. 



I. — The Long-Liyed Written Word 7 

II. — Business Letters 10 

III. — Courtesy and Kindness in all Letters. ... 15 

IV. — Food for Your Waste-Basket 20 

V. — W HAT OF THE POSTAL CARD ...<..,. 22 

VI. —Family Correspondence 27 

VII. — One Safe Confidential Correspondent ... 32 
VIII. — Letters One would Fain Recall .... 37 

IX. — A Question of Common Sense .... 41 

X. — Misunderstandings by Mail ..... 46 

XI. — When Silence is Golden 51 

XI r. - Letters of Courteous and Loving Duty 59 

XIII. — What to do with Anonymous Letters ... 64 

XIV. — Appendix — Superscriptions, Addresses, Invitations, 68 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



h 

Cfje lons-Ltoetf SSttttten Wittls. 

VERYBODY has to write letters. 
Some one of the hundreds of 
letters which the most ordinary 
individual will write in the course 
of his life- time, may make or mar 
his whole career. Every letter 
of the hundreds will have its 
own influence for or against his advancement or hap- 
piness. Every one, therefore, should know how to 
write letters. 

Should the composition classes and literary courses 
in our schools, the post-graduate literary societies and 
reading circles, of after years, accomplish nothing but 
to fit the man and woman of average intelligence to 




8 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



perform well this necessary and frequent duty, they 
would nevertheless more than justify their existence. 

It seems a simple thing to write a letter. Granting 
that one knows how to write and spell and construct 
a sentence, there should be, it would seem, no further 
difficulty. Yet of a multitude of clever, fairly edu- 
cated people, how few are adepts in the fine art of 
letter-writing ! 

Why is it so ? Do our teachers, in giving the rules 
for acquiring the power of expression in writing, for- 
get to emphasize their most ordinary and necessary 
application ? The topics set for a school-girl es- 
pecially are often too formal, or too remote from her 
every-day interests and sympathies. Why task her 
with writing "A Parallel between the Characters of 
Napoleon and Washington, " or an essay on " The 
Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians"? — 
we are drawing from real life. She might far better 
be set at framing an invitation to luncheon or dinner 
and the answer thereto ; an application for a position, 
or the response to an employer's advertisement for 
assistants ; or, for the development of descriptive 
powers and a slight indulgence to sentiment and 
fancy, a letter to a friend, describing the most eventful 
week in the writer's summer vacation. 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



9 



So much of character and breeding is inevitably 
revealed in letters, that too great pains cannot be 
taken that the revelation be not discreditable and 
damaging. 

Most of the counsels that apply to the spoken word 
of virtuous and well-bred people, apply with even 
greater force to the written word. For the spoken word 
may be half-heard, or forgotten ; but the written word 
remains ; and may come back in the most unexpected 
time and manner, either to the praise or the confusion 
of the writer. 

It behooves one, therefore, to know well what she is 
about when, to quote from the old-fashioned exordium 
to the letters of simple people, she " takes her pen in 
hand." 



II. 



ftu&imm letters 

BUSINESS letter should be as 
brief as is consistent with clear- 
ness, precision, and courtesy. It 
should be neatly and legibly 
written, and dated and signed 
with the utmost formality. 
Introduce no irrrelevant matter. If a lady has been 
hindered from keeping an appointment with her legal 
adviser at 3 p. m., she should not write a long letter to 
say that she had an appointment with her dentist at 
2 o'clock, and it was so much more trying than she 
expected, and she was really ill, and had to go right 
home. Let her simply say that indisposition hindered 
her from keeping her appointment ; and make up her 
mind to avoid so awkward a conjunction of appoint- 
ments another time. 

If she is ordering goods of any description by 
letter, her order should be written fully and clearly, 
the address at which they are to be delivered and th« 

10 




A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



I I 



date on which they are desired, given with scrupulous 
accuracy, and a copy of the letter kept, until after the 
order has been satisfactorily filled. 

If a mistake should be made in filling the order, 
let her see first if, perhaps, her own carelessness in 
ordering may not be in some sort responsible. In 
any event, the mistake must be courteously indicated. 
No matter how aggravating the blunder or the delay, 
she will not write a petulant nor an angry letter. And I 
can hardly think of an occurrence which would justify 
a letter of complaint of the subordinate with whom 
one may have had business correspondence, to his or 
her employer. 

Nowhere are definiteness, accuracy, legibility, neat- 
ness, and courtesy more necessary than in the corre- 
spondence between an applicant for employment and 
her possible employer. The fate of her application 
not seldom depends on her first letter. 

A lady will hardly engage for governess, companion 
or secretary, the candidate whose application is care- 
lessly worded and scrawled in a slovenly hand on 
vulgar stationery. 

The business man will not be prepossessed in favor 
of the would-be clerk who forgets to date her letter, 
and who reverses his initials on the superscription. 



12 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



The literary aspirant should never imagine that an 
illegible handwriting will pass for a sign of genius. 
She would better have her MS. typewritten. She will 
not help her case with the editor by telling him that 
it's a first attempt — he will probably discover that in 
a moment himself ; or that she has just " dashed it 
off " in a moment of enthusiasm ; or that she wants it 
published, because her father or her husband sub- 
scribes for the paper, and she would like to give them 
a little surprise ; or that she is greatly in need of 
money, and would like to have, by return mail, what- 
ever her MS. may be worth. 

Neither will she pave the way for a favorable judg- 
ment by telling him that a large circle of intelligent 
friends admires her work and urges its publication. 
There is no salvation for her literary efforts save in 
their own intrinsic merit, and the editor reserves the 
right to judge of that. There is nothing to be done 
but to send the MS., legibly written and addressed 
and sufficiently stamped, with a stamped and addressed 
envelope for its possible return trip to the sender. 

A woman's good sense and good breeding are in- 
dicated in her choice of stationery, whether in business 
or friendly correspondence. She does not use pink 
or green or other high-colored stationery; nor the 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



*3 



gilt-edged, nor fantastically shaped varieties. White 
or cream-tinted stationery, of smooth finish and firm 
texture, and ordinary size is always safe. Monograms 
and sentimental devices should be avoided. A lady 
with much correspondence does well to have her home 
address stamped at the head of her note and letter 
sheets. She should write with good black ink. 
Colored inks are in bad taste. 

One can hardly be too scrupulous in the matter of 
dates, signatures, and addresses, especially in business 
correspondence. Don't write at the head of the sheet, 
" Boston, Thursday," giving your home address some- 
where in the body of the letter. Write, rather for 
example, " 1 Grosvenor Park, Boston, Nov. 15, 1894." 
A married lady should not use her husband's name in 
her signature. She signs herself " Ellen T. Mortimer," 
not " Mrs. John M. Mortimer." In writing even to 
an absolute stranger, she signs as above, writing at 
the foot of the sheet, Address, Mrs. John M. Mortimer, 
or enclosing her card. 

An unmarried lady writing to a stranger, may indi- 
cate how she is to be addressed, either by enclosing 
her card, or putting Miss in parenthesis before her 
signature. 

We need say nothing about the odious brusqueness 



14 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS, 



sometimes affected by very young women under the 
impression that it is " business-like," of preluding 
their signature with " Yours, etc." ! 

One has always time to write " Yours truly," " Yours 
sincerely," "Yours respectfully," all of which are 
proper forms according to the relative positions of 
writer and recipient in business correspondence. 

A lady who has both business and social inter- 
course with men and women engaged in the profes- 
sions or in business, addresses all business letters to 
their office or place of business ; but all personal let- 
ters, invitations, etc., to their private residence ; un- 
less, indeed, she should be explicitly requested to use 
the business address for all purposes. 

It is almost needless to say that no well-bred person 
ever thinks of saving herself expense or trouble by 
leaving at a friend's place of business any object 
which must necessarily be taken thence to his or her 
home ; as books borrowed from his home library and 
gifts, including flowers. 



III. 



Cottrftsp anto fetn&iuas in all Letters* 

HE well-bred woman has sometimes, 
like every one else, disagreeable duties 
to perform ; among them, the writing 
of business letters which she would 
rejoice not to be obliged to write. 
But she differs from other women in this, that she can 
do her disagreeable duties courteously. She may have 
to remind a debtor of his indebtedness, but she will 
phrase her letter so that while her meaning is clear, 
he will not be harassed nor humiliated. 

The truly well-bred woman is a patient creditor. 
She does not lend money recklessly, leaving her own 
debts unpaid ; but w T hen she has made a loan, she 
does not make the life of the person she has obliged 
a burden until the debt is liquidated. 

She does business transactions in a business-like 
way. It is unlikely that she will ever be asked to 
advance a large sum of money without security. 
However good the security may be, the borrower 

15 




1 6 A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 

assumes not only the money debt, but a debt of grat- 
itude as well ; and if he or she be of an honorable 
nature, it is not at all likely that the latter debt will 
be forgotten, even after the former has been paid. 

So it is not necessary to rub the obligation in till 
the flesh of the debtor tingles. 

Let any of us who are blessed with abundance of 
this world's goods be large-minded in our dealings, 
especially with the less favored. Having loaned the 
money, and been duly secured, let us forget the inci- 
dent till the note comes due. If it be not promptly 
paid, wait a little for an explanation ; and if it be 
deemed necessary to write, be kind ; assume that there 
is a good reason for the delay. If some excuse is 
offered, and more time is asked, accept the excuse and 
grant an extension of time, if you possibly can. Do 
it magnanimously ; not meanly and grudgingly. 

If aught has happened between the lending of the 
money and the time of its coming due, to make it very 
necessary or desirable that you should have it at once, 
say so courteously. But don't press a poor debtor, 
either by nagging letters, or threatening letters ; nor 
proceed to extreme measures with any debtor, unless 
you have the gravest reason to believe that you are 
being victimized by some one who can without diffi- 
culty pay his debt. 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



This is not business-like advice, perhaps, but there 
is a higher thing than business ; and if you have abun- 
dance of means and the delay, however long, of money 
loaned, means not a deprivation of comforts, but, 
at worst, a little retrenchment in luxuries, choose 
rather to be known before God and man as lenient 
and forbearing — though the shrewd call you simple 
— than praised as a hard-headed businesswoman who 
can't be fooled. 

Should your debtor be a conscientious, high-minded 
woman, who really wants to pay you, and is delayed 
by unforeseen illness, family troubles, want of work, or 
any such things, think of her shame and humiliation, 
renewed again and again at every one of those curt, 
mortifying notes, which are so easy to write and so 
hard to read. 

It is your right? — Yes ; but mercy is higher than 
justice ; and you are suffering nothing by your tempo- 
rary inconvenience in comparison with what she is 
suffering for being the cause of it. 

Don't write high-handed dunning letters ; don't 
remind a debtor of the gratitude she owes you ; don't 
do any of the brutal, cruel things which the rich or 
well-to-do have in their power against the needy or 
the lowly, without first reading Christ's parable of 



18 A LADY AND HER LETTERS^ 

the servant to whom the debt of ten thousand talents 
was forgiven, and who thereafter put his fellow-servant 
in prison for a debt of one hundred pence. 

" But," say certain possible readers, " comparatively 
few of us are rich women. We are not in a position 
to make loans of a thousand, or even a few hundred 
dollars; so that what you say about ' good security/ 
'forbearance/ 'extension of time/ etc., doesn't apply 
to us. We are not called upon to practise the mag- 
nanimity you urge on us. Our little money trans- 
actions deal with dollars or even fractions of dollars, 
where it would be absurd to raise serious business 
questions." 

True ; but the counsel to delicacy and forbearance 
in the matter of five hundred dollars applies equally 
to twenty or even to five ; for these qualities are as 
often absent in the creditor for the small as for the 
large amount. 

It is true that the habit of borrowing is an exceed- 
ingly bad one, and that the chronic borrower should 
be discouraged for his or her own sake ; but occasions 
will arrive in the lives of the best and most independ- 
ent, when they will need, for a mile or two of the road, 
a helping hand, and if we are now able to give it, can 
we say that the day will never dawn when in turn we 
shall need it ? 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



*9 



We remember a conscientious woman who borrowed 
fifteen dollars from a near friend to tide over an emer- 
gency which had to be met before the money could be 
be earned. She had counted on repaying within a 
month ; but a few days after the loan had been made, 
she had a long letter from the lender, detailing sundry 
little losses which she had through the careless- 
ness of a servant, and closely estimating the money 
damage ; narrating also, the inconvenience she was 
at, through small sums owed by friends, etc. The 
fifteen dollars was still a week out of the reach of the 
debtor ; but it was the longest week she ever knew. 

If one has made these small loans, it is mean beyond 
expression to gossip about them with other friends, 
either in speech or letter ; for in the case of debtors 
sure to repay you, you needlessly betray their trust and 
impair their credit ; and in the case of careless debtors 
or those lacking conscience, you reveal your own weak- 
ness in trusting them, without helping your chances of 
getting your money back. 



IV. 



jFoott for gottr Sffltaste-iSasfcek 

OMEN of known wealth, and successful 
professional women often receive bor- 
rowing letters — or to call them prop- 
erly, begging letters — from absolute 
strangers. 

These usually run something after this fashion : — 
Dear Madam — Though but a short time in the city, 
I have heard on every side of your magnificent gener- 
osity. You are universally esteemed as a humanita- 
rian of the noblest type. This encourages me, a 
stranger, to appeal to you for a small temporary assist- 
ance. I have seen better days ; and am now main- 
taining myself and my two children, by the exercise 
of those gifts which formerly delighted a select social 
circle. Can you lend me twenty dollars till the next 
quarter of one of my wealthy music-pupils comes due. 
I have to go to my sick, perhaps dying, husband at 
Walnutville. I can send you for security an ancestral 
jewel of great value. It is in my husband's posses- 
sion, etc. Your suffering fellow-woman, 




A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



It is strange that any woman of even relative ma- 
turity and experience should fall a victim to a letter 
like this, but it is true that such an appeal entraps 
many a victim. Women are soft-hearted, and the 
reference to one's reputation for generosity is irresist- 
ible, even to women who think they are not vain. 

The place for such letters is the waste-basket. 
But, if you have a lingering fear that you may be 
neglecting a God-sent call, take the trouble to investi- 
gate a little first. Otherwise don't demand sympathy 
if you are taken in. 

A lady does not borrow of any one without the 
extremest need, and when she has contracted a loan 
she scrupulously retrenches unnecessary expenses 
until she has repaid it. 

But she never appeals to utter strangers for loans. 
This is a trick, resorted to either by utterly unsophis- 
ticated and ill-balanced young women, or — and this 
more commonly — by hardened adventuresses. 



V. 



SHRJat of tit Postal Cart ? 

HEN is it permissible to use a pos- 
tal card ? " asks a young friend. 

<c My dear," replies an old- 
fashioned gentlewoman, who looks 
in on us occasionally, " I never 
yet have been able to bring my- 
self to use one of those wretched things." 

We sympathize with the dear lady's sentiment, for 
the most part ; for, with letter postage at two cents ? — 
to put matters on the lowest plane — there is scant 
justification for using postal cards, even on the score 
of needful economy. 

But the postal card has a few well-defined and 
permissible uses. 

In these days of numerous and large feminine 
organizations, the secretary of a society may notify 
members of meetings by postal card. 

One may, with one's own family or a very familiar 
friend, announce by postal, the despatch of a box or 

22 




A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



*3 



parcel by express, especially, if the latter contain an 
invoice. Or, under the same conditions, and if greatly 
pressed for time, one may mention the train by which 
one expects to arrive from a short journey. 

If some one writes for information which can be 
given in a word or two, — enclosing an addressed 
postal for the answer, a lady will use the postal ; for, 
to do otherwise, would be to reflect on the manners 
of the sender. 

And here, we think we have exhausted the uses of 
the postal among well-bred people. 

The postal, in the above cases, must contain nothing 
but the briefest business statement ; no address but 
the superscription ; no terms of endearment, no dimin- 
utives in signature ; not a syllable of news nor other 
irrelevant matter. 

Here is a good form — 

Miss Amanda Jones, 
325 Lake Ave., 

Rochester, N. Y. 

(On reverse side), 

Boston, Dec. 19, 1894. 
Box despatched this afternoon by American Ex- 
press Company. Mary Jones. 



24 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



To write on a postal card particulars of your 
health, inquiries for the health of others, bits of 
domestic news or local gossip, Christmas greetings, 
etc., is about as vulgar as it would be to stand on the 
public street, and call out such information or in- 
quiries to a friend on the other side. 

And yet, many women who mean well, and who 
would be greatly surprised and grieved if they 
imagined a doubt were raised as to their good- 
breeding, constantly do these things ! 

The feminine passion for postals has even worse 
possibilities. 

Have we not seen a check for one hundred dollars 
and the kind and courteous letter in which it was 
enclosed, acknowledged on a postal ! As a receipt, 
it would stand in law, of course ; but who would feel 
much desire to cultivate a closer acquaintance with 
the person capable of sending it ? 

Have we not seen a Christmas gift acknowledged 
on a postal card, so closely covered with minute par- 
ticulars of the sender's health, that it was difficult to 
decipher it ! As if any one able to perform this feat 
of chirography on a card, might not have done it on a 
letter-sheet ! 

Have we not seen the birth of a son and heir 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



-5 



announced by postal ! Can't we recall two women- 
friends — old and experienced enough to know better 

— interchanging frequent accounts of their respective 
summering at beach and mountain, with allusions 
even to their "Cavaliers," as they called them, — on 
postal cards ? Have we not seen the postal in which 

— of all things — one woman conveyed to another 
her opinion of a third person's discourtesy? 

Here is a specimen of the postal card sentimental, 
so to speak, which is almost a literal transcript from 
life : — 

Feb. ii, 1894. 

Dear Friend : Your sweet letter came the other 
day, and now with the twilight shadows falling about 
me, I send you this little line of acknowledgment and 
affectionate greeting. May Heaven bless you. . . . 

One would not be overwhelmed with surprise at 
getting congratulations on one's marriage, per postal, 
from the writer of the above. 

It is a question with well-bred people, whether any 
postals, except the exceedingly few that are permis- 
sible, as described, deserve answer or notice in any 
way. At all events, something should be done to stop 
careless and inconsiderate people from loading the 
mails with such matter. 



26 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



" But,'' pleads somebody, " they're so handy ; and 
bad taste isn't a sin, I should hope, that it should be 
denounced so severely." 

True; but bad taste is a sort of danger signal that 
indicates people, who, if duty does not bind us to 
them, it is well for us to avoid, lest they become 
stumbling-blocks to us. 

Says Lilian Whiting in her " World Beautiful " : 
" A fault of taste ... is rooted in personality. It is 
the external manifestation of an internal defect. . . . 
It is not the result of an impulse of the moment, of 
a flash of temper, or some erratic and temporary 
emotion ; it is simply a thing that reveals the grain of 
life, its very quality." 

But defects of taste, like all other defects, can be 
overcome, if their possessor be observant and not too 
strong in self-love. 



VI. 



jFamilp CorrteponHence. 




HAT a delight to the homesick 
sojourner in a distant city or a 
strange land are long, minute, 
and warm-hearted letters from 
home ! And a delight at least 
equal to the home-dwellers, espe- 
cially if their circle of relatives 
and friends be small, and their 



lives uneventful, are the letters from the absent dear 
one, descriptive of a larger life and of unfamiliar 
scenes and customs. 

Such interchange of letters between the separated 
members of a family tends, more than anything else, 
to keep warm and bright the glow of family affection. 
How sad to see those who were nursed at the same 
breasts, brought up to adolescence under the same 
roof, drifted hopelessly apart in mature years and 
even ignorant of one another's whereabouts ! 

" Somehow, we stopped writing and lost sight of 
one another," is the common explanation. 



28 A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 

Once, and not so long ago, it was only the sons 
who went afar " to seek their fortune," as the fairy 
stories have it. The daughters almost never changed 
the town or city of their home, much less their native 
skies, except through marriage. 

But now it is quite as likely to be the daughter as 
the son of the family of limited means, who goes 
away to accept a more remunerative position than she 
can get in her birthplace. Then, with the reduced 
rates and improved facilities for foreign travel, many 
young women have the chance of a trip abroad. 

Whatever her duties or her pleasures, the absent 
one should make time for at least weekly letters to 
her family. And to whom should the most of these 
letters go ? Surely, if the father and mother are liv- 
ing, to them first of all. 

To say nothing of the evidence of unkindness, 
there is hardly a surer proof of inherent vulgarity in a 
family than the dispositipn to overlook the parents. 
The young woman who thinks that, because her 
mother is advanced in age, she needs in the way of 
dress little more than a decent covering, since " she 
never goes anywhere, anyhow," is reasonably certain 
to address her letters home to her favorite sister or 
brother, or mayhap to her chum outside the family, 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



29 



on the plea that " Mother hardly ever writes a letter 
herself," and that Frank, or Sadie, or Nellie, will tell 
her anything of interest. 

If she could know what a pride and joy a letter all 
to herself would be to the dear old mother, and how 
soon that mother would develop into an excellent 
correspondent, I think her action would be different. 

With women, in most cases, friends and interests 
fall off, as life advances. The mother, especially, is 
likely to get out of relation with her own early friends 
during that long period — the best years of her life — 
that are absorbed by the care of her young children. 
In this way, perhaps she falls a little behind the times. 
Her interests are narrowed to the home-circle. 

By-and-by, her children leave the home-nest, or be- 
come largely occupied with interests outside the home. 
How sad for the mother if she is made to feel that 
she can be no longer companionable to her children, 
now that her immediate use to them is over ; if they 
are the first to punish her for the consequences of the 
sacrifices which she has made in their behalf ! 

Write often to the mother. We remember an aged 
lady who was kept in the closest interest with the 
topics of the day, and who developed into a regular 
and most interesting correspondent through the neces- 



30 A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 

sity of answering the frequent letters of an absent son 
and daughter. If they could have realized the zest 
their letters gave to her declining years, and the 
pleasure she took in obtaining information which they 
requested, and writing her detailed accounts of the 
home doings, they would have been more than repaid 
for any slight effort involved in the keeping up of a 
frequent correspondence. We do not, of course, mean 
to suggest the exclusion or limitation of other inter- 
change of letters ; but only to say that the true lady is 
always minutely considerate of her own ; that she 
never slights her parents while God leaves them to 
her ; and that if her time for correspondence be 
limited, she thinks of them most frequently. 

Letters home, to whomsoever addressed, should be 
kind and cheerful, and as interesting as one's oppor- 
tunities permit one to make them. Never write 
sharply or pettishly. The written word, implying 
always, as it does, some degree of premeditation, is 
vastly more cruel than the unkind spoken word. 
Never write unnecessary bad news. Don't, for ex- 
ample, write from Chicago to Boston of that little 
indisposition which probably will have vanished before 
your letter reaches its destination. Don't write of 
your trifling disappointments, nor of the accidents 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



that can be repaired. And these cautions hold good 
also for the letters from home to the absent one. 

The poor Irish widow sending news to her son in 
America, in Ellen Forrester's touching little poem, is 
a model of kindly forethought : — 

" Tell him the spotted heifer calved in May ; 

She died, poor thing ; but that you needrft ?nind; 
Nor how the constant rain destroyed the hay; 

But tell him God to us was ever kind, 
And when the fever spread the country o^er, 
His mercy kept the sickness from our door. 

" Be sure you tell him how the neighbors came 
And cut the corn and stored it in the barn; 

'Twould be as well to mention them by name — 
Pat Murphy, Ned McCabe and James McCarn, 

And big Tim Daly from behind the hill ; 

But say, agrah — Oh, say I missed him still." 

Separated dear ones may suffer an immense amount 
of unnecessary pain, through want of knowing what 
not to write in their letters. 



VII. 



©ne Safe Confidential Correspondent* 

ORETHOUGHT and consideration 
do not, however, imply want of 
confidence. 

The young woman, far from her 
kindred, in a strange city, needs a 
^i#«^5?sa^pp trusty confidant. If she be wise, 
her letters home, especially her 
letters to her father or mother, will be the safety-valve 
for her natural desire for sympathy. It is dangerous 
to open one's heart to the chance acquaintance of 
boarding-house, or place of employment. 

It will do much more for the young stranger than 
merely to relieve her mind, if she accustom herself 
to full and frank communication with the dear ones 
at home. 

Writing to her mother, she need never fear to be 
accounted tiresome nor egotistical. While, as we 
have already said, she should not trouble that sensi- 
tive, anxious heart with minute accounts of trivial and 

32 




A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



35 



transitory ailments, nor disappointments nor accidents 
which will be comforted or repaired before her letter 
can reach its destination, still in all matters of con- 
sequence, in all cases where she feels the need of 
counsel, let her write freely to the one who is 
ordinarily the most patient, prudent and sympathetic 
of confidants. 

If she has gone away in quest of a better livelihood, 
let her tell her mother all about her work ; its advan- 
tages and disadvantages; the associates it gives her, 
her employers, her remuneration, her progress. Some- 
times, progress is very slow, and the worker cannot 
imagine why others are promoted while she remains 
stationary. If she has been frank with her mother, 
perhaps that patient and experienced friend can show 
her, without hurting her self-esteem, where her want 
of diligence or tact is keeping her back. 

Don't be selfish and shrewd with your family. 
Don't suppress your successes in writing home, lest 
they ask a little more help at your hands than you 
want to give. Perhaps there is an unthrifty brother 
or sister, who is, as such a one is likely to be, the 
mother's darling solicitude, and for whom you may be 
imposed upon a little. 

Even so, let not the first knowledge of your improv- 



34 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



ing fortunes come to your parents from strangers. 
Be large-hearted, and give what help you can, even at 
some personal inconvenience or sacrifice. There will 
come a day when the remembrance of a little selfish- 
ness and adroitness with one's kindred will give no 
pleasure. 

We do not mean to excuse the practice common in 
some families of putting too large a share of the com- 
mon burden on one ; nor of feeling that the successful 
one should have little personal advantage out of his 
or her success. Nor do we question the existence of 
occasional cases where entire confidence is impossible. 

But ordinarily, there are ways of meeting the con- 
tingency above suggested in a frank and kindly spirit. 
The mere fact of being away from home, enables one 
to draw more firmly the line between sweetly rendered 
duty and pernicious self-sacrifice. 

But while telling your successes, don't exaggerate 
them, nor raise on slight foundation, hopes that can- 
not be realized. 

Be frank, too, about the social side of your life. 
Here the greater knowledge and sympathy of a 
mother may be of inestimable value to the young 
woman who is making her way among strangers. 

Higher social opportunities may come to the daugh- 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



35 



ter than have fallen to the mother's share ; and com- 
plexities may arise for which her humbler experience 
affords no parallel. But human nature does not 
change; and on all serious things, the mother's 
counsel is sure to be worth having. 

In the matter of love-affairs, real or imaginary, the 
young woman of expansive temperament will save 
herself untold mortification and perhaps serious 
trouble, if — at least until after she has had an 
unmistakable offer of marriage — she will restrict her 
written confidences to her mother. 

Let the letters from home to the absent one be 
equally candid and kindly. A long, affectionate 
cheery letter from home on a gloomy and troubled 
day, may be a turning point in a young life. 

Answer her letters in detail. Show interest in her 
struggles, and pleasure in her successes. Don't 
imagine that the smallest details of the home-life — 
the new carpet in the parlor, Julia's first party-gown, or 
the visit of John's chum, or the school-triumphs of the 
smallest brother or sister, or the flourishing condition 
of mother's house- plants, or father's vacation week, 
are not worth writing. Tell her about the friends who 
call at the house. Forget no message that shows she is 
affectionately remembered in her girlhood's home. 



36 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



Do your share in strengthening those bonds which 
should be so flexible and finely tempered, that how- 
ever far they may have to stretch, they will still 
never break. 



VIII. 



Letters ©ne tooulli Jain Kccall. 




T is in Switzerland, I think, that 
women are regarded as never com- 
ing of age in the sense of being 
able to forego guardianship of some 
sort. There are times when behold- 
ing the imprudences which some 



women — women, too, well out of their teens — are 
capable of in letter-writing, one is disposed to see 
much sense in the Swiss idea, and to wish for its 
application — in a discriminating way of course — in 
America. 

Why are women whose training would lead one to 
look for wiser things, so willing, not to say eager, to 
enter on correspondences with people of whom they 
know little ; and to commit themselves in indelible 
ink, to confidences and sentiments, which in years to 
come they will remember with fear and shame ? 

Perhaps the question can be answered in a way 
rather complimentary than otherwise to our sex. The 

37 



38 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



average woman, even though she be " in society/' as 
the phrase has it, knows, after all, comparatively little 
of the wicked and heartless world with which men are 
familiar. Her judgments of men are generally super- 
ficial and favorable. Having but little foresight, she 
has little thought of consequences. 

Hence, she drifts quickly into intimacy with the 
agreeable stranger of either sex, and, if a separation 
takes place at an early stage of this intimacy, con- 
tinues by letter the dangerous self-revealings, family 
business, or personal gossip much less dangerous by 
word of mouth. 

"What is written is written, " and these foolish 
letters will outlive the intimacy of which they were 
the fruit, and be in damaging evidence, even when 
that intimacy may have turned to aversion. 

Whatever may be said of the prodigality of mutual 
confidences between women in their letters, there is 
scant excuse for the reckless effusions of women to 
men. We are not speaking now of the letters of 
lovers, on which the whole world smiles indulgently, 
but of what is called friendly correspondence. Oh, 
friendship, what mistakes are made in thy name ! 

After the folly is realized and repented of by the 
man or the woman — usually the latter — the question 
arises, " How did it ever begin ? " 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



39 



Did he write first, asking her for the name of that 
book she mentioned the day before he went away ; 
and adding to the inquiry a few lines to say how much 
he missed the chats they used to have together? And 
did she answer promptly, and at much greater length, 
giving not only the name of the book, but her opinion 
of it, and stating with perhaps a little over-emphasis 
of regret, how much she too, missed the chats ? 

And did it go on, till they were exchanging letters 
twice a week — just friendly letters of course ! — when 
one day she learned on indisputable evidence that this 
man who had her photograph, and entirely too much 
of her personal history, was an utterly good-for-noth- 
ing fellow, with whom she should not have exchanged 
a line ? 

Or, did this correspondence — only friendly, she 
would say — begin to take hold on her foolish little 
heart, and did all days seem dull and dreary save 
those on which the letters came ? 

And presently did his letters begin to grow shorter 
and farther apart, and did her awaking come in the 
shape of a marked newspaper announcing his mar- 
riage, presumably to some young woman who was not 
quite so good a correspondent ? 

However it was, letters of hers are extant which she 
would give worlds to have in her own hands again. 



4o 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



Well for her, if her nature be so modest and sensi- 
tive that she takes the bitter lesson humbly to heart, 
and never needs a repetition of it ; for then it gives 
to her life a grace that perhaps before was lacking- — 
making her distrustful of herself, and wise and merci- 
ful for others. 

Only when they are needed for the defence of her 
own or others' gravest interests, as life, reputation, 
fortune, will a lady keep letters which in any way 
compromise the writer. 

But one may say, " Letters of mine, mementos of 
follies outgrown and repented of, may be used to put 
me at a disadvantage, and I should be allowed to 
have something to offset them." 

Not so. Be honorable and generous, without 
reference to the possible treachery of any one else, 
and be sure that your best interests will not suffer in 
the long run. 

A lady will never let vanity in the high station of 
her correspondents, nor in the confidence which they 
repose in her, lead her to show letters plainly meant 
for no eyes but her own. She who does so defeats 
her own aim, incurring only distrust and sometimes < 
contempt as well. 



IX. 



§1 ©ttestton of Common Sense, 

VEN where the man in question is an old 
acquaintance and a man of honor, the 
woman should still beware of any over- 
eagerness for correspondence. In these 
days, when women are so active in litera- 
ture and journalism ; when wage-earning women are 
constantly brought into every-day business relations 
with men ; and when even women of leisure, through 
their activity in religious and charitable organizations, 
have much necessary intercourse both in speech and 
letter, with the clergy, public men, their masculine as- 
sociates in good works, it is important to remember 
the good sense, consideration, and reserve which mark 
the correspondence of the wise and well-bred woman. 

In the cases suggested above, the woman is often 
obliged, by the exigencies of business or charity, to 
open the correspondence. The interchange of notes 
may be necessarily frequent, without the slightest idea 
on either part of personal interest in the writer. But 

41 




4 2 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



if such friendly interest should be awakened, let the 
evidence of it, by all means, begin on the man's side. 

Good sense and delicacy in a woman do not imply 
prudery. If the correspondent adds to his business 
communication a friendly inquiry, or suggests an ap- 
pointment to talk over some case which it is difficult 
to settle by letter, she must not, in the name of all 
that is gracious and sensible, put into such proceed- 
ing a meaning which is far from the man's thoughts ; 
and astonish and annoy him with a coquettish or a 
prudish answer. She must be frank and simple, as 
she would be with one of her own sex in a similar 
case ; answering his kind inquiry pleasantly ; studying 
his convenience in the appointment. 

She must not expect a priest to neglect his sick- 
calls, nor any other busy man to leave his patients, or 
clients, or customers, to attend her in her drawing- 
room for a discussion of the ways and means to the 
Authors' Reading which she is getting up for her pet 
charity, the Home for Aged Couples. She must con- 
sider the time and strength of the man who is making 
the sacrifice of needed rest or recreation to assist her 
good work, and allow him to render his services in the 
way which suits him best 

I remember here the visit to Boston a few years 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



45 



ago of a gentlewoman famous for her position and 
ancestry, and still more widely and honorably known 
for her noble work in developing the Cottage Indus- 
tries of Ireland. She brought with her, anions: her 
introductions to notable Bostonians, one to a well- 
known, lawyer. 

As this gentleman emerged from his private office 
one afternoon, after a long consultation with a client, 
he noticed at the end of the row of clients awaiting 
their turn, a strange lady of distinguished bearing. 
He advanced towards her, whereupon, she presented 
her letter and her coronetted card. 

" But, Lady " he exclaimed, " why did you not 

send these to me, and allow me the pleasure of calling 
on you at your hotel, in the interest of a cause which 
I also have at heart." 

u Because your time is more precious than mine," 
she answered pleasantly ; " and I am asking a service 
at your hands which, with your own professional 
duties, it will inconvenience you to render, however 
great your sympathy." 

The wise and truly self-respecting woman is not 
conceited. Hence, when a man honors her request 
for his co-operation in some good work, she accounts 
the service done for the sake of the work, not for her 



44 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS, 



sake ; and is always convinced that the same assent 
had been given as cheerfully to any other petitioner. 

In her written intercourse with men on matters of 
business or charity, the well-bred woman, if a widow 
or maiden, is devoid of that silly self-consciousness 
which sees in every unmarried man a possible 
admirer. 

A young woman needing information on a matter 
of concern to her was directed to address the business 
manager of a certain publishing house, with whom she 
had already a slight acquaintance. 

But she blushed and bridled. Oh never ! how 
could she write to him. What would people think ? 
Wasn't he a fascinating bachelor ! 

It would have been a little cruel perhaps — though 
wholesome in the long run — to answer that the corre- 
spondence could be a matter of indifference even to 
one of the participators in it, to whom it would never 
occur to think of the state in life of his inquirer. 

Let a woman be frank, amiable and devoid of self- 
consciousness in the spirit of her letters, when she 
engages in any correspondence such as is above con- 
sidered. As to the substance of it, let it be brief and 
to the point. 

Brevity should not involve curtness nor obscurity. 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



45 



A letter of ten lines may be long, if the business 
could have been easily despatched in five lines. On 
the other hand, a letter of six pages may be short, if 
the importance of the business, and the necessity for 
a clear and explicit statement demand it. 

In such correspondence a woman may sometimes 
find that a man of kind heart and good intentions, to 
whom she inevitably contracts obligations on her own 
account or that of her charities, is deficient in the 
minor graces of perfect courtesy. She may find some- 
times a touch of business brusquerie which makes her 
feel she has perhaps blundered by proffering a request 
at a difficult time. But that does not excuse her for 
the omission of a single detail of consideration on her 
part, in the transaction of the business that remains 
to be done ; nor of any remissness or coldness in her 
note of thanks ; nor of the obligation of showing in 
time to come her gratitude and appreciation in any 
becoming and possible way. 

She is responsible for her own behavior, and while 
she must never be importunate, no small omission on 
the part of one who serves her cordially in large things, 
justifies the showing of wounded pride by reciprocal 
omissions. 



X. 



HERE are hundreds of virtuous, 
kind-hearted, and well-bred people 
who would never transgress on any 
of the points mentioned in the 
foregoing chapters, who will yet 
impulsively attempt the difficult 
and dangerous task of rectifying their misunderstand- 
ings with friends by means of correspondence. 

Difficult, we say, for it would take reams of paper 
and quarts of ink, even under favorable circumstances, 
to accomplish the result that might be arrived at in 
an hour's conversation ; and, dangerous, because the 
parties to the correspondence being out of touch with 
each other, so to speak, the written words are capable 
according to the mood of the receiver, of taking on a 
meaning never intended, and cannot be helped out, as 
in personal intercourse, with the tones and inflections, 
the looks and the gestures which give to language half 
its meaning. 

4 6 




A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



47 



Then, there are men and women, warm-hearted, 
demonstrative in manner, fluent in conversation, too, 
who have no facility in written expression. They chill 
and stiffen the moment they put pen to paper. 

I have known a man of this type, who, writing to 
his wife, would begin, "Dear Jane," and end, " Yours 
truly " ; and another, the kindest and fondest of 
relatives, who would write from the most interesting 
scenes, which he would describe in person with life- 
like vividness, the meagerest and driest of notes, 
without a word of endearment, and concluding in- 
variably, as he might conclude a letter to the merest 
acquaintance. I have seen the same peculiarity, 
though less frequently, with affectionate and demon- 
strative women. 

Manifestly, the person of similar temperament, but 
so fluent with his pen that his letters really reflect his 
personality, would never straighten out a tangle by 
correspondence with friends of the type above 
described. 

Let us take a case where the attempt is made. 
Two women have long been friends, but by reason of 
near neighborhood, common interests, and opportu- 
nities for frequent interchange of visits they have 
almost never had occasion for correspondence. 



4% 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



On one unfortunate evening they are together at a 
little social assemblage, or their club or charity 
meeting. Marion has had domestic worries during 
the day, and is in a morbidly sensitive condition. 
She has counted on walking home with her friend, 
and relieving her mind a little. 

Susan, not being gifted with second-sight, knows 
nothing of this ; and being, moreover, quite pre- 
occupied during the evening with another old friend, 
whom she has less frequent opportunities of meeting, 
observes nothing unusual about Marion, simply ex- 
changes greetings with her, and hurries home to some 
waiting duty, without offering the explanation that she 
does not know is needed. 

If Marion were in her normal state, she would take 
no offence, and would run in the following day for a 
morning chat over her trouble. But with her mental 
vision a little awry with her own especial grievance, 
she sees everything out of proportion, and after 
brooding over her friend's unusual action half the 
night, convinces herself that she has been purposely 
snubbed and slighted. 

And then in an evil hour, she writes Susan a 
sorrowful and mildly reproachful note, very vague as 
to the offence committed, and very clear as to her 
own wounded feelings. 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



49 



Susan is mystified and hurt. Her first and best 
impulse is to go right to her friend, and find out what 
the difficulty really is. But her pride is up, and she 
won't be outdone as a letter-writer. Her response 
falls like lead on the heart of her sensitive friend. 
Letters fly back and forth for a few days. The 
writers get down in swift gradation from " Dear 
Marion" and " Dear Susan" to "Miss Jones" and 
"Miss Robinson;" so much irrevelant matter is 
introduced that the original difficulty is lost sight of ; 
each discovers heretofore unsuspected defects and 
causes of offence in the other, and their friendship 
receives a wound which, if not fatal, is exceedingly 
dangerous and slow to heal. 

And here let us say, in all earnestness : Don't 
believe the silly sentimentalists who tell you that 
lovers or friends find their love or friendship only 
cemented by little quarrels. Things are said in these 
differences that humble and hurt, and are never, how- 
ever fervent the reconciliation, wholly forgotten ; nor 
the constraint which they occasion wholly removed. 

In the case of lovers or friends, one or other must 
be very magnanimous, patient and forbearing, if their 
mutual relations are not to be eventually the cause of 
more grief than joy. 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



" Beware the entrance to a quarrel," but if you 
come to it, don't stand on ceremony as to who should 
take the step that safely carries both past the danger. 

Be sure you really have a grievance, before you 
demand an explanation. If you think you have, try 
to see your friend and talk it out together. You will 
generally find that you have been shying at shadows. 

If you must write, be generous. Don't accuse. In 
a case like the common one above given, say some- 
thing like this, — 

" Dear ■ : — I had wanted especially to talk 

with you last night ; and am grieved because you went 
away without seeming to know or notice. Maybe you 
had some anxiety of your own. When can I see you 
for a good chat ? " 

It may cost a little sacrifice of one's pride to write 
a note like this : but no harm can possibly come of it. 
On the contrary, it will scatter the little mist, as a 
fresh breeze would, and leave the light of your 
friendship undiminished. 



XI. 




TDQben Silence id (3cR>en* 

ON'T write when you are vexed — however 
just the provocation. You will surely say 
something that you will later have cause to 
wish unsaid. 

If you have received a captious, fretful, 
bitter, unjust, or even spiteful and imperti- 
nent letter, the best rebuke you can possibly give the 
writer is absolutely to ignore it. To "talk back" with 
your pen puts the offender on her mettle. After she 
sent that letter, ten to one she would have been glad to 
call it back. She had a bad quarter of an hour thinking 
how you would receive it. But your answer comes at 
once, full of annoyance and pain. She begins to justify 
herself, and your peace of mind and dignity suffer. 

Pay no apparent attention to the unjust or im- 
pertinent letter. Give its writer time to think it over, 
and, in all probability, she will eventually see her 



51 



52 A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 

blunder and try to repair it. If she does not, you are 
still the gainer by ceasing to hold intercourse with her. 

Christian charity obliges us to feel kindly and act 
kindly to all ; but it does not oblige us to invite insults 
for the sake of forgiving them ; nor to keep our minds 
in a state of unrest and sadness by intercourse with 
people to whom we are not bound by duty, and with 
whom, by reason of difference in temperament and 
training, we could never assimilate. 

Outside of such cases as the above, however, a lady 
tries to answer as promptly and fully as possible all 
the letters which she receives. 

Business letters, for obvious reasons, should never be 
allowed to stand unanswered. Remittances should 
be immediately acknowledged ; if only by a line or 
two. Accounts rendered should be met by full pay- 
ment, if possible ; partial payment as next best thing ; 
or a word of courteous explanation, if the delay of 
payment be inevitable. 

If you have given your name as a reference — and 
need we emphasize the necessity for caution and con- 
science in doing this? — to any one seeking employ- 
ment, be prompt in answering the letter of his or her 
possible employer. Remember that the whole future 
of a fellow-being may hang on your prompt and kind 
keeping of your word. 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



53 



A question arises here as to how far the men and 
women whose reputations make them, in a sense, 
public characters, are in conscience or courtesy bound 
to answer the questions which the mail is constantly 
pouring in upon them. It were a heavy task to count 
the requests for financial assistance, for employment, 
for "influence," for advice, for co-operation in charita- 
ble schemes, that beset the public man, or the woman 
of letters, in the course of a month, both from friends 
and acquaintances and from absolute strangers. It is 
part of the penalty of fame. 

"I should have to employ an extra clerk, and in- 
crease my income by $10,000 a year to be able to 
cover these demands," said an eminent professional 
man, of his own case. 

And a well-known woman of letters declared that 
she would need about three hours a day to cover the 
interrogations that drifted in daily to her desk. 

" I have had scarcely a letter to-day," she said, 
pointing to a large pile, " that did not contain a re- 
quest for something or other, most of them preferred 
by people I never saw or heard of." 

Mrs. S. encloses tickets for the appearance, under 
her patronage of a young dramatic reader — "A very 
select affair, dear \ right in my own drawing-room. 



54 A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 

Tickets $2 apiece, and you won't mind taking three, 
to help the dear girl." 

Miss Brown, of whom an intimate friend says that 
she lies awake nights devising schemes to plunder her 
friends in the interest of her benficiaries, invites a 
subscription of ten dollars to a testimonial which she 
is getting up for a most estimable lady who needs a 
trip to Europe for her health. 

A young widow, a perfect stranger, writes from New 
Orleans to ask her to find a newspaper correspondence 
for her in Boston. She thinks she can write ; she once 
won a prize for a Prohibition story. 

Another woman dumps upon the long-suffering 
author a MS. of two hundred pages, requesting a 
written criticism of it, at her earliest convenience. 

A college youth wants material for a certain bio- 
graphical sketch which he is asked to prepare for the 
commencement. 

A young teacher wants paying work on a newspaper 
during her summer vacation so she " won't lose any 
time." 

A man who is getting up a library for sailors wants 
autograph copies of all her works. 

A pious lady who is conducting a journal for a 
church fair wants from her an article for each of its 
six issues — the first one to be delivered to-morrow. 



A LADY A. YD HER LETTERS. 



55 



Miss E., whom she knows but slightly, asks her to 
arrange a lecture tour for her through the New 
England States. 

And Miss F., whom she never met but once, and 
of whom she knows absolutely nothing, wants per- 
mission to use her name as a reference in her applica- 
tion for a place as invalid's companion. 

How should this woman with more demands on 
her time and money than she can possibly respond to, 
dispose of these letters ? 

She should have the courage to return out of the 
three tickets for the" dramatic recital, the two which 
she cannot afford to take. 

Prudence, as well as kindness, may oblige her to 
participate in the testimonial ; but she will not offend 
against charity nor courtesy by returning the MS. 
unread, referring the college youth to the Public 
Library, and letting the rest of the letters go by 
default. 

A lady will think more than twice before she writes 
a letter to an absolute stranger, especially a letter 
soliciting a favor. 

The fact that the literary, or musical, or artistic 
work of man or woman is before the public does not 
make the author, or musical composer, or artist, public 
property. 



56 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



We do not speak, now, of course, of the letters of 
appreciation and grateful acknowledgment to author or 
artist for pleasure or benefit derived from his book, 
or song, or picture; nor the word of intelligent criti- 
cism, or suggestion, or even remonstrance, which is 
sometimes in order; nor the welcome line of en- 
couragement which the older worker sends out of a 
kind and helpful heart to the young beginner on the 
road to the temple of fame. 

We speak only of the unreason of writing to one of 
whose private life and circumstances we know noth- 
ing, but whose public work is manifestly of a nature 
to absorb most of his time and strength, to request 
services which would involve a great outlay of both, 
especially when he knows nothing of our character nor 
capabilities except what our exceedingly inconsiderate 
letter reveals. 

The public man or woman of letters is under 
no obligation to take the slightest notice of these 
petitions. It is a stretch of kindness and courtesy, if 
he or she send a line of acknowledgment and regret. 

If we but stop a moment and consider what the 
obligatory labor of the statesman and the successful 
author must be ; also, that they probably have in 
addition family cares, and that being mere mortals 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



5 7 



they need rest and recreation, we will hesitate before 
we write in the interest of the Woman's Rest Tour to 
Bourke Cockran or Frederic Coudert ; or ask Richard 
Malcolm Johnston to read our little MS. novel of five 
hundred pages ; or Edmund Clarence Stedman to look 
up a publisher and secure favorable terms for our first 
volume of poems ; or Agnes Repplier to arrange the 
course of lectures which we long to give but which the 
world is not, perhaps, quite ready for. Nor shall we 
expect the overworked journalist, whose time is but 
little at his own disposal, to go about, arranging syn- 
dicates for us. 

Such requests as above alluded to are made in 
utter ignorance of the time and effort which are 
needed, even under reasonable and favorable con- 
ditions, to set such enterprises as we are interested 
in afloat. 

It should be needless to say that we should not ask 
references of people who do not know us ; and yet 
what prominent personage has not been called upon 
to stand social or business sponsor to people of whom 
he hardly knows the face and name? 

Again, let us be considerate in the pushing of good 
works, and the solicitation of financial help, with 
public men, however rich they are reputed to be, or 



58 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



however generous; or how worthy, soever, the charity 
we are forwarding. 

We are doubtless but one of many, and there is a 
limit to the longest purse. 



XII. 



Xetter of Courteous anfc Xoxnng £>ut2* 




UT for ourselves, who are not rich nor 
famous, and whose correspondence, there- 
fore, is only of the ordinary family, friendly, 
and social order, let us answer promptly 
those letters which demand response. 



Such, of course, are all invitations to social functions. 
It is not enough, in such cases, to assume that u silence 
gives consent : " one should write at once and definitely 
whether or not one can accept the invitation to a 
dinner party, ball, musical, luncheon, formal reception, 
or other social event. 

The reason for this is obvious. 

For her table arrangements, grouping of guests, etc., 
the hostess needs to know as early as possible how 
many and whom she must plan for. And this holds 
as good for the little social events among people of 
moderate means as for the " functions " among the 
late Ward McAllister's "Four Hundred." 



60 A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 

There is only one way to acknowledge a formal in- 
vitation ; and that is by a formal note of acceptance 
or regret, addressed to the one who sends the invita- 
tion. One may be very well acquainted with the 
sister or cousin or aunt of the prospective hostess, but 
one is not therefore justified in sending word by any 
of these personages — " I '11 come." 

There are few things which conduce more to the 
preservation of cordial and unconstrained intercourse 
even between intimate friends, or prospective relatives! 
than the observance of the little formalities instituted 
to keep society pleasantly together. Why should one's 
dearest friend, or one's sister or brother who, residing 
at the other end of a large city is sometimes more 
easily reached by a note than by a personal visit, 
neglect to answer as to whether or not he or she can 
meet the friends from Philadelphia to whom one is to 
give a tea the next Sunday evening? Let us consider 
as we would be considered in all these things. 

A lady is prompt in her letters of congratulation to 
her relatives and friends, whom she cannot reach in 
person, on all the occasions which custom and good 
feeling decide to be so remembered; as betrothals, 
marriages, birthdays, and wedding anniversaries ; or- 
dinations and religious professions, and their more 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



61 



important anniversaries, as silver and golden jubilee 
days ; notable accessions of fortune or honor. 

Such letters should not be perfunctory, but hearty 
and joyous. No irrelevant matter — especially of an 
uncongenial kind — should be introduced. The writer 
should not point morals, nor draw contrasts, nor inti- 
mate that love may fail, and that fortune is fickle. 
Half-hearted and grudging congratulations are better 
unsaid ; and compliments with a monition included 
are not allowable, at least between people of equal 
age and condition. 

Letters of sympathy are even a more delicate test of 
the good feeling and good taste of the writer. The 
condolences that are sent with evident intention to save 
the writer the trouble, or the strain on her feelings, of 
a personal call, were much better unwritten. 

c< But I never know what to say on a call of condo- 
lence," says a young friend. "And I'd rather go 
without my breakfast than write a letter of con- 
dolence/' 

The question is rather of what not to say at such 
calls, and in our letters of sympathy. But the right 
thing and the kind thing is to call on your bereaved 
friend as soon as possible after the bereavement. 
She may not be able to see you, but she will certainly 



62 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



appreciate your thought of her. But if she can see 
you, your sympathic silence, the tender clasp of 
your hand, your very presence will say everything. 
If, however, distance or other good cause hinders 
your call, be very careful about your letter. The 
bereaved heart is sensitive. I beg you will not write 
that you meant to call, but the day was so hot, or so 
cold, or so rainy. Or that you would have come on 
a certain afternoon, only it was so hard to get a car — 
as if there were not seven afternoons and as many 
mornings and evenings in a week ! Or, you thought 
of calling on a certain day, but you had to go out to 
Cohasset to those delightful people, the Gays ; and 
so on. These examples are not drawn from fancy ; I 
have very lately seen letters of condolence on the 
above plan, and from one who would be painfully 
surprised if she knew that any one questioned either 
her politeness or her kindness of heart. 

Letters of this sort offend against courtesy and 
kindness both. 

The thought which will rectify our action in such 
cases is " How should I like to be dealt with in my 
own sorrow? " 

You know you would not like to sit solitary in the 
desolated house in the first dreadful weeks following 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



63 



on death's visit. You know it would grieve you to 
find that a friend — lavish, in sunny days, of protesta- 
tions of affection — would not bear a trifling discom- 
fort from heat or cold, nor postpone a pleasure for 
your sake in your sorrow. 

Don't take the preacher's tone in your letters. Let 
them show, especially in the first weeks of bereave- 
ment, that you share your friend's grief. Speak of the 
Divine consolations, and of resignation to the Divine 
Will, but tenderly, modestly, humbly, that the sorrowing 
heart may not feel chilled nor rebuked. 

Here, especially, the respective relations of writer 
and recipient must be seduously remembered. Here, 
again, even more carefully than in letters of opposite 
character, are the formal and perfunctory to be 
avoided. 

After all, the kind and considerate heart alone can 
guide the hand aright in letters of sympathy and all 
other correspondence. 



XIII. 



TOibat to Do witb Bnon^moue Xetters. 




OR a last word let us touch briefly on that 
-4 epistolary pest, the anonymous letter. I will 
not say that a lady never receives one. 
There are too many spiteful and envious 
people in the world, for the winner of any 
notable success not to be the probable target 
of these poison- tipped darts, whose point of departure 
cannot be traced back. 

Yet I have known more than one woman of suffi- 
ciently marked social or professional success, and 
charm of person or manner to make her an object of 
envy to small and jealous natures, who, notwithstand- 
ing, never received an anonymous letter ; just as she 
never received distasteful observation or attention in 
travelling. Such a woman is of the few who, by the 
meekness with which they wear their distinction, and 
their unremitting kindness and interest in others' suc- 
cesses, somewhat veil their own, and by disarming 
jealousy, escape its more active demonstrations. 64 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



65 



But such women are but a small fraction of one per 
cent of the attractive and successful of their sex. 

The favorite feminine target of the anonymous 
letter-writer seems to be the woman who is receiving 
marked attentions or who is known to be engaged. 
The phenomenal woman above noted escapes the 
anonymous letter-writer by an unannounced and very 
brief engagement. But for the average young be- 
trothed, half the joy of the time is in her right to 
receive her lover's open devotion and to show her 
pride in him : in the family festivities and the con- 
gratulations of her friends. But some day comes the 
letter signed "A Friend," "A Well- Wisher," " One 
Who Knows," or any other cowardly mask of a signa- 
ture. There are dark hints, ordinarily reflecting on 
the past or present life of her lover, sometimes thinly 
disguised jests or gibes. But the object is always the 
same — to excite suspicion and thus poison happiness. 
The young wife, as well as the young betrothed, is 
often the victim of these vicious missives. 

Now what does a prudent woman, with proper 
respect for herself and for the man to whom she is 
betrothed, or whose name she bears, under such cir- 
cumstances? Just one thing. She burns the anony- 
mous letter and forgets it. She does not carry it one 



66 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



hour on her person ; she takes no one into her confi- 
dence about it; she makes no attempt to identify the 
handwriting. She contemptuously ignores it, and 
goes her way untroubled. 

There may be an exceptional case of persecution 
by anonymous letter which will justify man or woman 
in having recourse to the protection of the law; but 
ordinarily, the letters cease if they are disregarded, 
and this is true of anonymous letters of every sort. 

The anonymous troubler of your peace has an eye 
on you, be sure. If he find that the poisoned arrows 
are broken against the granite of your confidence 
and reserve, he will soon tire of the amusement of 
shooting them at you, and will try them on more 
vulnerable material. 

Need we add that a lady never, for any conceivable 
motive, writes an anonymous letter? There is never 
a justification for it. One should not write a line to 
any human being on any subject to which one would 
shrink from affixing the full signature. 

The anonymous letter, whose contents are trivial 
and innocent, is silly; the anonymous letter contain- 
ing a grave charge is cowardly. If you know that a 
danger threatens a friend, give her warning, and tell 
her honestly on what your apprehensions are founded. 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



67 



Or, in the case of the young and inexperienced, warn 
parents or guardians. 

If you cannot do this, hold your peace. 

Another thing — let nothing tempt a woman into 
anything like a familiar correspondence with man or 
woman whom she has never seen, and as to whose 
personality and circumstances she has no reliable in- 
formation. If any one wants to know, not the danger- 
ous, out the ridiculous and unpleasant possibilities of 
such a correspondence, let her read that clever story 
of Maria Edgeworth's u L'Amie Inconnue," which we 
would like better with the plain English title of " The 
Unknown Friend." 

If the foregoing little papers, collected in their pres- 
ent form at the request of many friends, need justifica- 
tion may it not be found in the tremendous postal 
service, one-third at least of whose energies are em- 
ployed in the transmission of letters which should 
never have been written? 



APPENDIX. 



XIV. 

Superscriptions, BDDresees, ITnvttations. 




N compliance with a very general request, follow- 
lowing the publication of the first edition of 
"A Lady and Her Letters/' this chapter on 
superscriptions and addresses, which the author 
has endeavored to make comprehensive, is added 



to the book. 

A Catholic lady ought to know and observe the 
correct usage in writing to ecclesiastics. 

It is unlikely that she will ever have to write to His 
Holiness, the Pope ; but if she should, the superscrip- 
tion should be, for example, as follows : 

His Holiness, 

p p e _ f 

Rome, Italy. 

and the letter should begin. 

Most Holy Father. 

63 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



6 9 



The superscription and address for a cardinal who 
is also an archbishop should be like this : — 

His Eminence^ 

James Cardinal Gibbons, 

Archbishop of Baltimore, 

Baltimore, A fa 7 . 

Within the letter, Your Eminence, his full name and 
title being repeated at the bottom of the letter. 

For the apostolic delegate, 

Bis Excellency , 

The Most Reverend , D. D., 

Apostolic Legation, 

Washington, D. C. 

and within, Your Excellency. 
For an archbishop, 

The Most Reverend John J, Williams, D. D. 

Archbishop of Boston, 

Boston, Mass. 

and within, Your Grace, or, where less formality is 
proper, Most Reverend dear Archbishop. 

Catholics or non-Catholics can use either of these 
forms, or, if they prefer, Most Reverend dear Sir. 



7o 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



Bishops are addressed as above, with the substitu- 
tion of Right Reverend for Most Reverend. 

" Your Grace " is not used in addressing a bishop. 

In Europe and in Canada a bishop is addressed as 
My Lord, Your Lordship. 

Our American Bishops object to these titles : — 

" Lord me no lords ; you left your lords in Ireland," 
said Archbishop ( then Bishop ) Kenrick to an Irish 
priest, who addressed him according to the custom of 
the latter's country. 

A well-bred American Catholic sojourning in foreign 
lands will, however, follow the custom of the country 
in the matter of ecclesiastical and secular titles. 

In Ireland all bishops are addressed Most Reverend. 

Religious usually address an archbishop or a bishop, 
Most Reverend dear Father, Right Reverend dear 
Father; and a lay Catholic may use this form of ad- 
dress in writing to the archbishop or bishop of the 
diocese in which he lives. 

Abbotts are addressed as the Right Reverend. 

Monsignori are of various grades, some having the 
title of the Right Reverend, others of the Very Rev- 
erend. 

Vicars-general are addressed in this form : 

The Very Reverend Peter Gray, V* G. 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 71 

or, if he be also a doctor of divinity, 

The Very Reverend William Bryne, D. D., V. G. 

and within, Very Reverend dear Sir, Very Reverend 
dear Father or Doctor ; never Dear Vicar-General. 

Deans, superiors of seminaries, and sometimes 
presidents of colleges are also the Very Reverend. 

A secular priest is addressed in this form : — 

The Reverend John Martin. 

or, if he be a permanent rector, 

The Reverend Francis Desmond, P. R. 

or a doctor of divinity, 

The Reverend James Stone, D. D. 

If a priest have the degree of D. D. and any other 
degree or title, the D. D. comes first, as, 

The Reverend Arthur Fitzgerald, D. D. y LL. D. 

except when he is a member of a religious order or 
congregation, in which case the initials of the society 
come first, as, 

The Very Reverend John Hogan, S. S., D. D. 
The names of priests who are members of religious 



72 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



orders or congregations are followed by the initials 
which designate the society, as, 

C. M., for Congregation of the Mission, ( sometimes 
called Lazarist or Vincentian Fathers). 

C. P., Congregation of the Passion ( Passionist 
Fathers). 

C. PP. S., Congregation of the Most Precious 
Blood. 

C. R., Congregation of the Resurrection. 

C. S. B., Congregation of St. Basil. 

C. S. C, Congregation of the Holy Cross. 

C. S. P., Congregation of St. Paul ( Paulist Fathers ). 

C. SS. R., Congregation of the Most Holy Re- 
deemer ( Redemptorist Fathers). 

C. S. Sp., Congregation of the Holy Ghost. 

C. S. V., Congregation of St. Viateur. 

J. F., Josephite Fathers. 

M. S., Missionary Fathers of La Salette. 

M. S. H. Missionary Fathers of the Sacred Heart. 

O. C, Order of Charity. 

O. C. C, Order of Calced Carmelites. 

O. M. C, Order of Minor Conventuals of St. 
Francis. 

O. M. Cap., Order of Capuchin Fathers. 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



73 



O. M. L, Oblates of Mary Immaculate. 
0. P., or 0. S. D.j Order of Preachers, or Order of 
St. Dominic (Dominican Fathers). 
O. Prem., Order of Premonstrants. 
O. S.j Order of Servites. 
O. S. A., Order of St. Augustine. 
O. S. B., Order of St. Benedict. 
O. S. F., Order of St. Francis. 
O. S. H., Oblates of the Sacred Heart. 
P. S. M., Fathers of the Pious Society -of Missions. 
S. J., Society of Jesus ( Jesuit Fathers). 
S. M., Society of Mary ( Marist Fathers). 
S. P. M., Society of Fathers of Mercy. 
S. S., Sulpician Fathers. 

In addressing a secular priest, do not write, 

The Reverend Father James Jones, 
but simply, 

The Reverend James Jones, 
Neither write, 

The Reverend Fatlier Smith, 
when, by an effort of memory, or a glance at the 



n 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



Catholic Directory, you can ascertain his full name, 
and write, 

The Reverend Joseph Smith. 

A priest is to be addressed at the church to which 
he is attached, as, 

The Reverend George Johnston, 

Rector of St. Joseph's Church. 

or, if he be an assistant, 

The Reverend Paul Trainer, 

St. Joseph's Church. 

Within the letter, a priest, secular or regular, should 
be addressed, Reverend dear Sir, Reverend dear Father, 
or Dear Father ( surname ). A Doctor of Divinity is ad- 
dressed as, for example, Dear Reverend Doctor Stone. 

Heads of Brotherhoods are often addressed as 
Reverend Brother, the Reverend in this case, as with 
the heads of religious orders of women, being simply 
an honorary title. Individual religious in the brother- 
hood are simply Brother James or Brother John, as the 
case may be ; and within, Dear Sir, or Dear Brother 
James. 

Heads of religious communities of women are 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



75 



addressed, according to the custom of the order or 
congregation, as Reverend Mother (name), Mother 
(name), Madame (name), Sister Superior (name) ; and 
within, Dear Madame (a proper address for any lady), 
Dear Reverend Mother, Dear Mother, Dear Sister 
Superior. When one has occasion to write to the 
head of a convent and does not know the name of 
the Superior, address, Mother Superior or Sister 
Superior, according to the custom of the order or 
congregation. Some, like the religious of the Visita- 
tion, give the title of Mother to the head of every 
house; some, like the Sisters of Notre Dame, accord 
it only to the General Superior. 

But never be guilty of the tautology of Mother 
Superioress or Sister Superioress. 

Private religious are properly addressed as Dear 
Madame or Dear Sister. 

A Catholic lady who has much correspondence 
with ecclesiastics and religious will do well to keep 
the Catholic Directory among her reference books. 

The Catholic who has occasion to write to Protes- 
tant clergymen uses the titles by which they designate 
themselves. This is recognized as an obligation of 
courtesy. 

One does not commit one's self to a belief 5* the 



76 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



validity of Anglican orders by addressing a bishop of 
the Protestant Episcopal communion, as, 

The Right Reverend Luke Grafton, D. D., 

Bishop of Fond du Lac, 

Wis. 

any more than Pope Pius IX. made common cause 
with the Southern Confederacy by answering the 
letter of Jefferson Davis to the title which that 
gentleman assumed. 

The President of the United States is addressed as, 
His Excellency, 

The President of the United States, 
Executive Mansion, 

Washington, D. C. 

and within the enclosure, Mr. President. 

The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court is ad- 
dressed as, 
The Honorable, 

The Chief Justice of the United States, 

Washington, D. C. 

Judges of the Supreme Court as, 
The Honorable Justice [name), 

Washington, D. C. 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



77 



Within the enclosure they are addressed as Your 
Honor. 

Judges of the circuit courts and all other judges, 
senators, members of Congress or of the State Legis- 
latures, and mayors of cities get Honorable before 
their names. Custom seems to dictate that a man 
who has this prefix through an elective office, retains 
it for the rest of his life ; and an aged man, of notable 
services to the community, though he has never held 
office, is often addressed as The Honorable. 

Members of Congress have M. C. after their names 
while in office, as Honorable Bourke Cockran, M. C. 

The Governor of Massachusetts is, by law, His 
Excellency ; and though the same obligation does not 
exist elsewhere, governors of States generally are so 
designated. 

Address a governor, for example, as follows : — 
His Excellency, 

Ho 7i. Frederic T. Greenhalge, 

Governor of Massachusetts, 
and within, Your Excellency. 
A mayor, as, for example, 



78 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



Hon. William L. Strong, 

Mayor of New York, 

and within, Your Honor or Dear Sir. 

Military and naval titles precede the name of those 
who bear them, while the initials U. S. A. and U. S. N. 
follow, as, General William Sullivan, U. S. A., Com- 
modore Jacob Jones, U. S. N. 

Members of the foreign legations in the United 
States are usually styled His Excellency. If a mem- 
ber of a legation have no other title, he is properly 
addressed as The Honorable. For the full titles and 
ranks of these dignitaries, consult Spofford's American 
Almanac. 

A proper and simple conclusion of letters to eminent 
churchmen or statesmen always is, 

/ have the honor to be, 
Mr. President, Tour Grace, Your Excellency (as the 
case may be) , 

Yours very respectfully, 



Members of the United States Consular Service are 
styled simply Esquire. Members of the Diplomatic 
Service of the United States are The Honorable, 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



79 



Physicians are addressed, for example, as, 
Francis Bowditch, M. D. 

or, 

Dr. Francis Bow ditch. 

but the Dr. and M. D cannot, of course, be used 
together. The physician is addressed within the en- 
closure as Dear Sir or Dear Doctor , but not, Dear 

Doctor without the surname. 

If a man hold office as the superintendent of a 
state or civic department, .or membership on a com- 
mission, his title, when it is desirable to use it, never 
precedes, but always follows his name. For example, 
well-bred people never write nor say, Superintendent 
of Streets John Brown, but, Mr. John Brown, Superin- 
tendent of Streets ; Chairman Rapid Transit Commis- 
sion Crocker, but, Hon. George G. Crocker, Chairman 
of the Rapid Transit Commission. 

These official designations are not used in social 
correspondence. 

Esq. is properly used in the United States after the 
name of private citizens of acknowledged social posi- 
tion, lawyers, and literary men who have no college or 
university degrees. In any of these cases, however, 
Mr. is equally proper. It should be used instead of 
Esq. in invitations. 



80 A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 

It does not follow, however, that Esq. can be 
always substituted for Mr. It is proper to address 
the humblest laborer as Mr. when one has occasion 
to write to him ; but it would be in very bad taste to 
give him the title of Esq. 

It is needless to say that Mr. and Esq. cannot be 
used together. 

Dear Sir or My dear Sir is a proper beginning for 
letters to any of the dignitaries mentioned in the fore- 
going pages, except where another form is given, or 
for letters to any gentleman, except where one's 
acquaintance warrants the less formal " Dear Mr. 
(name)" or one's kinship or friendship permits the 
use of the baptismal name. 

Need we say that "Dear" in the cases mentioned is 
not a term of endearment, but simply the softening of 
the written word, which the eyes and voice would 
supply for the same word, spoken? And yet, through 
prudery or some other nonsense, women have been 
known to begin letters to gentlemen with Sir, or Mr. 

9 not realizing that this form of address verges on 

the insulting. 

Even the most business-like of business letters be- 
gins Dear Sir, except when one is writing to a firm, 
when a proper form is, for example, 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



81 



Messrs. Brown, Durrell 6° Co., 
Boston. 

Gentlemen {not Dear Sirs) : — 

Only in business letters is it proper to write the full 
name and address at the beginning of the letter, as 

Messrs. Pitt d° Scott, 

39 Broadway, 

New York. 

Gentlemen : — 

In all letters to dignitaries, ecclesiastical, civil, or 
military, in all friendly correspondence, the name and 
titles (but not the residence) are given at the foot of 
the last page. 

In very formal and brief letters, one writes only on 
one side of the page. In all others, we should follow 
the natural order of the pages, and not skip from one 
to three, and from two to four, as many do ; nor write 
lengthwise on one page and crosswise on another. 
With stationery and postage as cheap as they are, 
there is no excuse for crossed letters. 

A lady's visiting card is a safe guide as to her 
name on the superscription of a letter to her. If you 
know how she wishes to be addressed, do not alter 
her preferred form because you think another form is 



82 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



more correct or elegant. To do so is impertinent; 
and to make a mistake in the name, which a little 
attention would have hindered, shows a carelessness 
which can hardly fail to prejudice the recipient of 
the letter against the writer thereof. 

A married lady is addressed on the envelope by her 
husband's name as, for example, 

Mrs. David Russell, 

40 Euclid Ave., 

Cleveland, O. 

A wiiow, being entitled to retain her husband's 
name on her visiting card may continue to be so 
addressed by letter; but if on her card she reverts 
to her baptismal name, then her letters must be so 
directed. 

An unmarried lady, of any age, is addressed, for 
example, as Miss Morse or Miss Mary Morse, accord- 
ing to her rank in her family, or as her cards set forth. 

Never address a letter, whatever the position of the 
recipient, without the Mr., Mrs., or Miss, which cour- 
teous custom demands. 

A letter to any lady with whom one is but little 
acquainted, begins My dear Madam, iot Madam ; and 
never Dear Miss. 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



83 



In less formal relations one begins, for example, 
My dear Mrs. Newton or Dear Mrs. Newton, My 
dear Miss Gray or Dear Miss Gray; and with intimate 
friends one uses the Christian name. 

In writing to men or women, My dear Sir or My dear 

Madam or My dear Mrs. or Miss , implies 

a greater formality than Dear Sir, Dear Madam, etc. 

Letters, to whomsoever written, always conclude 
with some complimentary expression, as Yours truly, 
Yours sincerely, Yours faithfully, Yours cordially, etc. 
Good taste must decide the form. 

A man may sign himself " Yours respectfully " to a 
woman even many years his junior, but a woman 
would not use this form to a man of her own age or 
younger than she, unless his position in church or 
state required it. 

If one's letter is rather long, one repeats the name 
at the end, as, 

/ am, dear Miss Wilson, 

Yours, with sincere regard, 



8 4 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



ITnvttattons, 

Invitations to large and formal entertainments are 
engraved, either on thick white paper, folded once in 
the middle, or on large cards. The style varies, but 
a fashionable stationer is always ready with the latest. 
Invitations to a dinner are given in the name of both 
host and hostess. 

This is a good form : — 

Mr. and Mrs. Francis Gilbert 

request the pleasure of 
Mr. and Mrs. George Doane's 
company at Dinner, 
February sixteenth, at seven o'clock. 
QI2 Bacon Street. 

A lady may, if she prefers, write her own dinner 
invitations, but the same form must be used. 
The acceptance would be in this form : — 

Mr. and Mrs. George Doane 
accept with pleasure the polite invitation of 
Mr. and Mrs. Francis Gilbert 
for dinner 
on February sixteenth^ at seven o'clock. 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



8s 



If they are unable to accept, this regret would be 
sent : — 

Mr. and Mrs. George Doane 
regret extremely that a previous engagement 
must deprive them of the pleasure of accepting the 
invitation of 
Mr. and Mrs. Fra?icis Gilbert 
for Diiiner, 
071 February sixtee?ith, at seven o'clock. 

These invitations should be answered immediately, 
and with a positive acceptance or a regret. They can- 
not be accepted conditionally. If, after acceptance, 
anything happen to make the keeping of the engage- 
ment impossible, write at once to your hostess, so that 
your place may be supplied. 

One does not use R. S. V. P. (Repondez s'il vous 
plait) nor the better English form, The favor of an 
answer is requested, after an invitation to dinner, as 
every one is supposed to know that such invitation 
must be answered, and with promptitude. 

Invitations to a wedding are also engraved, and are 
sent in the name of both parents, in this form : — 



86 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



Mr. and Mrs. John Atwood 
request your presence at the marriage of their 
daughter 
Grace to Maurice Talbot 
at St. Marfs Cathedral, 
on Wednesday \ June fifth, at nine o ) clock. 

or, 

Mr. aud Mrs. David Ormond 
request the pleasure of your company 
at the marriage of their daughter, 
on Thursday ', June sixth, at ten 6 ) clock. 
Church of the Holy Trinity. 
With this latter form, which would be preferred if 
the bride have a stepfather, the cards of the bride and 
bridegroom-elect are enclosed. 

A widower or a widow issues the cards for a daugh- 
ter's marriage in his or her name alone. If the bride 
is orphaned the cards can be sent in the name of an 
aunt or married sister, substituting sister or niece for 
daughter in the formula. 

If the church wedding be followed by a reception, 
those bidden to the latter receive also with the invita- 
tion to the church, a card : — 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



87 



Reception 
at 25 Linwood Ave., 
At 2 P. M. 

or, 

At Home 
after the ceremony, 
16 Forest Hill Street, 

Answers are not sent to wedding invitations ; but 
those who cannot attend send their cards to the bride's 
parents or the relatives issuing the invitation, to assure 
them that it has been received. 

Invitations to large evening entertainments, as also 
to luncheons, " At Homes," garden parties, are in the 
name of the hostess alone. 

In the first case this is a proper form : — 
Mrs. Geoffrey Desmond 

requests the pleasure of company 

oji Tuesday evening, January tenth, 
at nine o'clock. 
The favor of an answer is requested. 

The hostess may write : Dancing, Music, in the 
lower-left hand corner, to indicate the nature of the 
entertainment, but never the word " ball." 



88 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



For invitations to receptions, teas, etc., the hostess 
may use her visiting card. If the reception be given 
in honor of some celebrity or a visiting friend, she 
writes on the card, To Meet (name of the guest of 
honor ), with the date and the hour; in other cases, At 
Home, with the date and hour. 

These invitations do not require an answer. 

Fashion now discountenances abbreviations and fig- 
ures, except in business correspondence. The number 
of the street, however, may be in figures. 

As fashion is changeable, do not criticise people 
who hold to the older custom. 

Invitations to formal dinners and luncheons are not 
sent to people in deep mourning, but all other invita- 
tions are sent as usual, after a month from the time 
of bereavement. 

Invitations to informal dinners and other informal 
entertainments are written by the hostess in the first 
person, and answered, of course, in the first person. 

A young unmarried lady never sends invitations in 
her own name. All invitations to a refined home are 
from the heads thereof. 

If the oldest daughter of a widower preside over 
his household, his name and hers may appear together 
for dinners, receptions, and At Homes. In such case, 



A LADY AXD HER LETTERS. 



8 9 



also, the daughter, if no longer very young, may issue 
her own cards for a tea ; but even in her invitations 
to small and informal entertainments, she writes for 
her father and herself, as, for example : — 

Dear Miss Sutherland : — 

// will give great pleasure to my father and to me, if 
you and your brother will dine with us on Sunday next, 
at two o'clock. 

Yours faithfully; 

fa?iet Wins low, 
Boston, January second, Eighteen Hundred and 
Ninety-five, 

Invitations should all be mailed at once. The 
reason of this is too obvious to be insisted on. No 
one should be made to feel that he has been a 
second thought. Invitations to dinners, luncheons, 
At Homes, are sent a week or a fortnight in advance ; 
to parties, a fortnight or three weeks in advance. 

Letters of introduction, in the giving of \vhich one 
should be most prudent, are always written in a spirit 
of kindness and compliment to the bearer. On the 
envelope with the name, and when necessary, the 
address appears, also the name of the person intro- 
duced, as, 



9 o 



A LADY AND HER LETTERS. 



Mrs. Peter Van Buren 
Introducing Miss Dodge. 
or 

Mr. Paul Merritt, 

35 Prank/in St., 

Boston. 

Introducing Mr. James French. 

The bereaved who wear mourning have their visit- 
ing cards with a narrow black margin, and their 
stationery of dead white with a similar black margin ; 
the heavy mourning borders are no longer in the best 
form. 

There are bereaved persons — some of them the 
sincerest of mourners — who do not wear mourning, 
object to it on principle. These do not, of course, 
use black-edged cards or mourning stationery. 

If you are not in mourning yourself, do not use 
mourning stationery in letters of condolence. 

It is always in good taste to seal letters with sealing 
wax and a seal — if one wishes to do so ; but the 
glued envelope is equally correct and more convenient; 
and in sending letters to distant countries it should be 
remembered that the wax melts in hot climates. 



Making Friends and Keeping Them. 



FIFTH EDITION. 

By Katherine E. Conway. 

Opinions of the Press. 

From the Bos' on Herald : — 

If Miss Conway's suggestions were faithfully followed, a 
great many people would find life far sweeter and more beau- 
tiful. She has struck a vein which has been unworked. 



From the Boston Courier: — 

The topics handled with such good sense, strength, and deli- 
cacy in .this monograph on a theme so invariably interesting 
are variously related to the central thought of friendship and 
the surest way to keep it in constant repair. These fair pages 
carry away a lesson worth giving careful attention to. 



From the Ave Maria : — 

Nor Emerson nor Bacon has written so wisely of friendship 
as has Katherine E. Conway in this delightful little book. 
. . . Platonic friendship, under the title " His^Yoman Friend," 
is intelligently and delicately treated in chapter second. In- 
deed, every point is marked by rare common-sense, as well as 
a fine apjireciation of that best of gifts — friendship. 

(i) 



From the Boston Globe: — 

Excellent knowledge of character and motives, with line 
literary qualities. 

From the Somerville Journal : — 

Another interesting and valuable book for its many sugges- 
tions and its fulness of wisdom has been written by Katherine 
E. Conway, under the title of " Making Friends and Keeping 
Them." ... In its small compass it deals thoughtfully and 
thoroughly with many of the important and delicate prob- 
lems of friendship. 



From the Boston Beacon : — 

The title of Katherine Conway's little book should at once 
commend it to the notice of all who have the deeper social 
nature which demands of the cherished few something more 
than mere acquaintance. The brief and pointed essays mak- 
ing up the contents of the volume cover a wide ground, and ar<f 
eminently practical. 

From the Messenger of the Sacred Heart : — 

It is only a few months since we had the pleasure of noticing 
the first edition of " A Lady and Her Letters." Our commen- 
dation of it was unqualified. The best proof of its merit, how- 
ever, is that a new edition has been so soon called for. Its 
companion volume — " Making Friends and Keeping Them " 
— if anything, is superior in merit to the first. Its theme is 
more comprehensive. The relations which it treats are more 
far-reaching and delicate. The treatment requires a more ex- 
tensive knowledge of human nature and of the ways of the 
world, and a power of discernment and gift of discretion 
which are given to few. Miss Conway has brought all these 
accomplishments to her delicate task in a very high degree, 
• . • Few are more intimately acquainted with the strength 
and weakness of woman than Miss Conway; and, conse- 

(2) 



quently, few are better qualified than she to speak with author ■ 
ity to her own sex. She does so with a candor and sweetness 
and power which cannot fail at the same time to win, to con- 
vince, and to influence the reader towards that gentleness, 
"forbearance, constancy, and self-sacrifice which form the char- 
acteristic of a true Christian lady. No one can read Miss 
Conway's books without becoming wiser and better, and thus 
making a loug stride towards reaping the true purpose of life 
— our own true happiness and the happiness of our fellow- 
beings. 



From the American Ecclesiastical Review : — 

Educators and those who appreciate the advantages of 
refinement arising from the cultivation of sound principles, to- 
gether with external accomplishments, will find efficient aid 
in these exquisite little volumes. They are written with a 
rare knowledge of human nature, — of its strength as well of 
its weakness, — and this knowledge is put forth for the benefit 
)f the many who would learn, with confidence-inspiring judg- 
oent, winning frankness, and in a tone which attracts, while 
t exemplifies and illustrates the themes of the writer. Such 
manuals are easily read, and the charm of their contents is 
prickly felt. They should, through the co-operation of the 
olergy, find their way into every family sitting-room, for they 
instruct in the best kind of knowledge, whilst they edify and 
delight. 



From Donahoe's Magazine : — 

This is no string of chapters revamping platitudes derived 
from studying the, numberless essays on friendship that have 
preceded it. It is a fresh and wholesome contribution to the 
popular literature upon the relationship of friends, the best 
way to make and to hold them; and the impression vividly 
conveyed to the reader is that the writer is speaking from 

(3) 



the actual experiences of her own life, which, by the way, has 
been singularly well cast for the preparation of a book upon 
the subject treated. Miss Conway's style is sweet, winning, 
and strong. Her matter is of the very essence of practical 
wisdom and common sense. There is a pithiness of gentle 
philosophy throughout the book which will make a hundred at 
least of its sentences remembered and quoted. Though ad- 
dressed to women, the advice given is appropriate to both sexes, 
and no one can read this little book without much clearing up 
of erroneous impressions regarding the true offices, and mutual 
conduct of people standing to one another in the happy, con- 
soling, and withal critical relationship of friends. To many 
after a first perusal this book will become a real treasure of 
counsel and guidance, and will no doubt save many of its 
readers from the painful consequences of an ill-advised friend- 
ship, or from carrying on a true friendship in an ill-advised 
way. 

From the Catholic Standard and Times, Philadelphia: — 

The table of contents shows ten chapters, each with a name 
that awakens thought. There are no cool statements which 
the reader is supposed to accept without protest, but there 
are facts with which we are familiar, their cause and effects. 
It is a lady's book, which is equivalent to saying that it is the 
very best kind of a woman's book — true, strong, kind, and 
with a sweet reserve and dignity which expresses culture, 
self-restraint, and consideration for others — a book for a girl 
who has sense and uses it. It is dedicated "To Elizabeth A. 
Cronyn, a Pearl of Women and of Friends, " thus associat- 
ing it most delightfully with happy memories of the Catholic 
Summer School at Plattsburg. 



m 



Questions of Honor in the 
Christian Life, 

(FOURTH EDITION.) 
By Katherine E. Conway. 



Opinions of the Press. 

From the American Ecclesiastical Review: — 

This is the third, volume of Miss Conway's " Family Sitting- 
Room Series," and we cannot let it pass without a word of 
comment which may appeal to the clergy. To suggest that this 
little book represents an important chapter in pastoral theology 
must seem exaggeration. Yet to know what goes on in the 
home and society where those of our flock hold converse, who, 
as the dedication words say, have "in a special way the honor 
of our holy Faith, in their keeping " — this is worth more to the 
missionary priest than the mastery of scholastic categories. It 
is true that 11 Questions of Honor " gives us but a very brief 
and limited glimpse into ordinary home life; but that glimpse 
is given in the flash-light of Catholic truth which perpetuates 
the impression received from its everlasting source. Thus the 

(l) 



priest who, in a more special way than any " Child of Mary," 
has in his " keeping the honor of our holy Faith " is made to 
feel more correctly and strongly the sympathy of views and 
aims which animates the choicer elements of Catholic society. 
Can we do anything better than take up, and keep up, in 
sermon or conference with the judicious treatment of the 
subjects which possess the thoughts of those among the laity 
who love virtue and would compel its diffusion? Here are, in 
familiar form, practical religious topics as they fashion them- 
selves in the minds of intelligent Catholics : " The Courtesies 
of God's House ; " The Letter and Spirit of Sacred Seasons;" 
"Snobbery in Religion ;" "Refinement and Beauty in the, 
Externals of Religion ; " " The Liturgy and the S. Scriptures ; " 
such are the main themes touched lightly with a woman's 
knowing hand, but pointing to a thousand resources of de- 
velopment in the pastoral sphere. 



The Very Reverend William Byrne, D.D., V.G., Boston — 

Commends the " Questions of Honor " unreservedly, and 
suggests the fitness of this and the other numbers of the series 
for supplementary reading in Catholic schools. 



From the Catholic University Bulletin (touching on the whole series) : 
Written chiefly for the home circle, and more particularly 
for the author's sisters, they contain much that everyone might 
learn, or knowing, recall to memory. The expression is always 
correct and elegant in these pages, while the sentiment is fed 
from the springs of religion, genial common sense, and the 
science of those canons of politeness and savoir-faire which are 
valid the wide world over, because they are the " fine flower " 

(2) 



of natural charity. From the last page of the " Questions of 
Honor " we copy a thought which is typical of the work and 
might easily serve as an introduction to these exquisite 
manuals of Christian courtesy and gentleness : — 

" Let the Catholic woman be not merely what she must be 
for her own soul's sake, — pure, truthful, charitable, grounded 
in her faith and exact in its practice ; but let her be with this, 
for the sake of others and for the extension of God's Visible 
Kingdom, sweet-spirited, cheerful, courteous, patient, gener- 
ous, large-minded, minutely honorable and faithful ; graciously 
attentive to all social duties and observances, fluent of speech 
at need, and, withal, steadfast and courageous as any martyr- 
mother or maiden of the olden time, should she be compelled 
to choose between God and mammon." 



From the Ave Maria : — 

,( Questions of Honor in the Christian Life " is a book of 
great interest as well as of solid instruction. It could have 
been written only by a woman of unerring Catholic instinct, 
wide observation and thoughtful habit. There is nothing lurid 
in her philosophy, but neither is there anything watery or 
apologetic. Our girls who accept her for their mentor will lose 
no pleasure in life that is worth having, and they will have cul- 
tivated a high Christian character. Miss Conway's pen has 
rendered notable service to the Church in the United States, 
but none, we believe, so great as the writing of the Family 
Sitting-Room Series." 



Charles Warren Stoddard : — 

You have done the very thing that was most needed in 
Catholic literature, and you have done it perfectly well. 

(3) 



Eliza Allen Starr : — 

" Questions of Honor " is even more pleasing to me than 
the others, because it touches on sacred things so safely, and 
with such a trained hand. It is a great pleasure to take up 
these books and feel how near you have come to the hearts 
and consciences of many whom sermons do not reach. 



A. J. Faust, in Church News : — 

The book is charmingly discreet, the accomplished author 
putting himself, from the outset, perfectly en rapport with her 
audience, and discussing great themes with an air of equality 
with readers that at once captivates attention. It is surely 
no easy task to acquire the art of fascination in didactic 
writing for old or young, but I must say that with Miss Con- 
way it is a gift rather than an art ..." Questions of Honor 
in the Christian Life" will hold its own place in the Family 
Sitting-Room Series, and when that series is completed the 
author will have rendered a literary service to Catholic women 
of the greatest value. Charming style, refined taste, and 
earnest faith make Miss Conway's work a Catholic boon, of 
which we have no equal in our American literature. 



From the Independent (Protestant): — 

The ingenious title of this book brings the author to her sub- 
ject in the happiest way, and gains her one point in the argu- 
ment at least. She is herself a Roman Catholic, and writes 
from the point of view of her church. . * . The book will not 
hurt the stiffest Protestant, but may do him much good. When 
the easy allowances for difference of ecclesiastical member- 
ship are made, there still remans a residuum, and a large one, 
of pure gold for all believers. 

(4) 



A Dream of Lilies. 

(THIRD EDITION.) 
By KATHERINE K. CONWAY, 



Opinions of the Press. 

From the Boston Transcript:-— 

Here appear the music and spontaneity of the true singei 
who sings simply because it has pleased God to make her 
nature such that, when stripped of restraint and left to follow 
its bent, singing is its inevitable outcome ; of one who sings 
from pure joyousness, and for the song's sake. . . . Out of the 
initial (and title) allegory, "A Dream of Lilies"— to select 
just one — breathes a haunting melody that, once heard, refuses 
thereafter to be ignored, but lingers and recurs perpetually 
with its persistent and welcome charm. 

From the Catholic World: — 

Graceful and tender, and devoid of pretentiousness in 
treatment, they at the same time reflect a depth of feeling and 
a grasp of imagination that, with a more forcible vehicle of 
expression, must strike the reader as the attributes of the true 
poetic mind. In method, at times, Miss Conway reminds one 
somewhat of the painstaking and delicate treatment seen in 
Spenser's work, minus its effort and ornateness. The title 
poem is a very beautiful bit of sensitive writing ; were it not 
too lengthy for the purpose, we would anticipate some of the 
reader's pleasure by quoting it bodily. Many will find through- 
out the volume the experiences and emotions that gladden or 
cloud our daily existence treated in such a way by the skilful 
hand of the author as cannot fail to bring the comfort we all 
feel, no matter how philosophic we be, from the true and beau- 
tiful expression of the feelings which stir us. 

(5) 



Watchwords from John Boyle 
O'Reilly. 

(SIXTH EDITION.) 
Edited and with Estimate, by Katherine E. Conway. 



Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes: — 

It is a most dainty and charming book to look upon, and 
it contains the utterances of a true poet, who was also a true 
man. 



John Greerileaf Whittier: — 

My dear friend, Katherine E. Conway: I thank thee for 
the beautiful book with its just and appreciative estimate ot 
Boyle O'Reilly as a true and noble man, and a poet of whom 
not only Ireland but America should be proud. Reading the 
" Watchwords, " I was never before so impressed with the 
beauty and wisdom of his verse. Liberal, generous, liberty- 
loving, holding fast his own faith without bigotry or intoler- 
ance, he held a place in our country's literature which no 
other can fill. 



Edmund Clarence Stedman: — 

Nothing could have more individuality in its beauty, mate- 
rial, and moral than this tribute. 



Christian Symbols and Stories 
of the Saints. 

(Fifth Edition, $1.50.)' 

By Clara Erskine Clement. 
Edited by Katherine E. Conway. 



Houghton, Mifflin & Company 
Boston and New York, 



JUL 6 1908 



,/ 



